Sarcasm

Immigration is seriously worried about the Chinese coming to the US to have kids to get them the American Citizenship prize. Called Birth Tourism, apparently it’s bad and wrong and the US government wants to stop it. Seems these people buy plane tickets, rent hotels, have their kids and go back to China, where after some number of decades their child might return to the US for, among other things, the education. I’m not sure how I feel about all that, but I do observe they areplaying by the stupid rules we’ve established that being a foreign national and having a kid in the US makes the kid a citizen and entitles their parents to come along for the ride. And they seem to be doing it through perfectly legitimate, even trackable means too.

The Chinese may be getting screwed on this deal. California being California there’s no guarantee that 17 years of so from now they won’t pass a law saying Californians are obligated to educate everyone in China anyway, because that’s how they seem to roll out there on the high powered left coast.

It’s an interesting insight that so many Chinese would like to be Americans isn’t it? Well, at least in the current currency of American citizenship which the Obama Administration is working so diligently to debase these days.

Hmmmm.

Imagine, some of them are defrauding the hospitals! Well! Thank heavens everyone else who staggers across the borders illegally and avails themselves of our services makes sure they settle all their hospital bills right?

and these Chinese people, they lie!

“These people were told to lie, how to lie, so that their motives for coming to the U.S. wouldn’t be questioned,” Claude Arnold, a special agent with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, told the Associated Press.

Shocking!

this must be as opposed to not even bothering to have to lie and just crossing the Rio Grande or the desert someplace between San Diego and El Centro where you get scooped up and processed at a “detention facility” before you are flown or bused by the government to the city of your choice in the US.

What makes me go hmmmmm is the curious fact that our government, nay, our very President, has encouraged tens of thousands of Mexican and Central Americans to sneak into the country, and is intent on making all of them citizens right now, well, certainly trying to get the job done by the 2016 election, when of course they won’t vote for Republican candidates. There’s no point in beating around the Obama here and pretending that’s not the plan going forward. I’m trying to figure out why the usual host of Raul Gravilja’s and Luis Gutierrez’s aren’t out there doing their best to protect these Asian-American citizens in the making!

I guess it’s not all illegals, I’m sorry, undocumented (though technically, they ARE documented aren’t they) immigrants that Raul and Luis and Barack are fighting for.

Federal prosecutor William Weinreb took charge of presenting the first profile of Tsarnaev to the jury, stating that the accused had “had murder in his heart” and had wanted to kill Americans.

“He believed that he was a soldier in a holy war against Americans,” Weinreb said. “He also believed that by winning that victory, he had taken a step toward reaching paradise.”

Tsarnaev also thought that the U.S. government was the enemy of the Muslim people,” Weireb added.

Or, he thought he was a holy warrior, for Islam.

See, that’s just silly, the jury should disregard that allegation from the getgo, because it’s just not possible according to the White House and State Department and numerous other executive agencies. There had to be something else that motivated him, like anger about marathons or something. After all, in the closing of the trial of Major Nidal Hasan, the Army prosecutor said it wasn’t about religion, it’s wrong and un-supportive to tie his actions to religion. So why would the Federal prosecutor in Boston start out by explaining the perp thought he was a holy warrior fighting for Islam against Americans? That just doesn’t make sense. There’s no tie to Islam here!

If those ‘committing the crime’ delusionaly think it’s for Islam, it doesn’t matter what they think. If we decide that’s not why they’re doing it then that’s not why they did it. That’s been made pretty clear in the Fort Hood massacre, the case where the solider was decapitated in England, the beheading in Oklahoma, the Charlie Hebdo massacre, or the coffee shop attack in Sydney, or the one in Copenhagen. And that whole ISIS isn’t Islam thing too. The Crusades!

Hmmmmm.

I’m not sure what the Federal prosecutor is trying to say, or prove here. I hope someone from the West Wing gives him a call and tells him to knock that crap off. I could better understand if it were being done by a prosecutor working for the whackjob rightwing citizens of the city of Boston, those redneck morons, but a Federal prosecutor?

If he’s not careful and keeps making these links to Islam then there could be a mistrial or it might fuel people’s intolerance. They might start getting irritated and commit hate-crimes like drawing cartoons of the prophet or saying there’s a link between Islam and radical terrorism (as opposed to just plain old conventional terrorism).

Almost last and not least, not to tell the Supreme Court justices how to do their jobs and all, but does it matter more how much damage is done to the country when an unconstitutional law is allowed to stand or how much economic damage is done if it is determined to be against the Constitution?

So these discussions yesterday about Obamacare death spirals and all, do I misunderstand the principle such that the Supreme Court determinations should be based on the damage done if we find something isn’t Constitutional and we can and must excuse bad law if it’s going to cause economic hardship above some arbitrarily determined point?

Hmmmmm

Oh well, clearly if it’s going to economic hardship we should just let the law stand as currently interpreted by his Highness, because well, it would hurt to undo the thing now. Besides His Majesty can probably fix it with an executive extension or rescission or action or something to get around whatever silly argument is being made that the legislation as written and intended, shouldn’t be taken verbatim in THAT particular portion. All the other things the legislation said should be taken at absolute face value until the King changes what he wants them to mean, but the wording in the part about State exchanges should be considered fungible because it might hurt to undo it.

There’s a lot of internetness going on over Jay Carney and the choice of posters in his kitchen.

Priorities people….but what the hell, it’s Sunday morning and I’m not cranky yet. Maybe I will be when I’m done .

Apart from the choice of Soviet Era posters that Joe Stalin may have had the originals of in his garage or basement pool room let’s take a visual tour of the rest of the place.

First let us note, admire, and praise the skill of his son flipping that egg, and timing it all so his sister can point at it at precisely the right instant for the camera. Come on people, that’s pretty awesome. How many of you have TRIED to flip an egg in the pan? That boy got some serious hang time there, and I have to assume it’s still going up because the egg hasn’t even rotated over yet. AND I want to be there when that still runny yoke smacks into the pan from that height as Newton’s laws do their thing when it comes back down. Ah, good times, good times…..

Second, I hope the Carneys (Given this photo, can I spell it Carnies? That joke never runs out does it.) enjoy the repast they’ve laid out. When Michelle gets wind of the sugar laden carbo loaded feast for two dozen that the four (I’ve allowed for the photographer) are about to settle down to she’s going to have words with Jimbo about healthy diets.

Food to the left of them,
food to the, uh, even further left of them,
food behind them.
Stacked and plated,
sliced up with special care,
boldly it sits, all there,
gather ye world, and stare.
No spot on the counter bare,
none of them have bed hair,
displaying their hominess flair,
the family of Carney.

Let’s see – nice plate of butter sticks, looks to be about two pounds, poached eggs in cups, bananas just in the left of the frame, blueberries strewn across the counter closing in on one infidel strawberry, sliced bread plates, a tray of bagels, stacks of muffins, stacks of Danish. I can’t tell if that’s an entire cheese cake covered with strawberries, or a massive bowl of said fruit.

Yep, life must be goooooooo-oood at the Carney house if that’s a normal breakfast layout. Maybe there’s a slew of undocumented maids off camera that will be eating after the Carney family is finished picking over this smorgasbord buffet pastry collection that wiped out the local bakeries’ stock for the morning. I’m surprised they’re all so healthy looking if that’s what they normally lay out. What about the hungry? What about the poor? That’s a lot of cash, well, for me it is, laying out in baked goods that are going to get stale before noon. I’d swear they were feeding way more than 4 people. I’ve seen local computer user group meetings where that layout would be the first go round as the vultures, uh, participants, arrived for the 8:00 am opening.

I don’t know, maybe those pastries were provided by ‘green’ bakers looking to schmooze Jay so he’ll put in a good word with the boss for the next big payoff, I uh mean of course, stimulus package. I don’t really care what Jay does with his paycheck, that’s his business, but, dude, kinda wasteful, no? Maybe that’s just the deep down stingy Yankee in me talking. Maybe it’s the jealous guy who’s fighting off and losing against the advance of his stomach over the belt border line. Maybe I’m just a racist who resents imported possibly undocumented Danish pastry taking the jobs of American baking powder biscuits and corn muffins. I think I’m suffering class envy!

As I write this I am link hunting, and discovered Noah Rothman’s most excellent de-construction of this, and other pictures I didn’t know existed. I’ll leave this to Mr. Rothman now, read his piece. I can’t top his, but I am encouraged to see several of the observations he made were ones I made myself.

Where I was going anyway was what disturbs me, and still does despite Rothman’s wonderful take down is that THIS is what it takes to piss people off. THIS is what we talk about around the table, at the water cooler, wherever. We’re not pissed enough that they might be listening in to our phone calls and reading our emails and accessing our computers. We’re not angry enough that they’re ignoring, inventing and mis-enforcing the laws, that they’re using executive branch agencies to clamp down on every conceivable corner of our way of life while they plot new ways to stuff us in neat little demographic pens. Where they can pander and feed and water and house us while they whip up our anger against the people two pens down because they have a bigger pen than we do. They give us a new ball to keep an eye on in a never ending shell game while they pick our pockets and divide us for their own ends.

We riot over whether or not our team loses in the NCAA, heck, we may riot if they win. We worry and grouse, and demand action against “the rich”, without stopping to wonder whether or not we’re ‘rich’ to the guy on the other side of the tracks.

Especially pernicious is their use of race to deflect and divert justifiable criticism of their policies as they work to divide us. Focusing on what makes us different while claiming they want us to embrace and accept everyone in harmony.

Based on the photos, with the exception of the posters (kinda scary really) I guess they want us to judge people based on the content of their kitchen.

I thought I’d, you know, take a tour of QandO. A real tour, of things I might use more than once every year, because prior to this my ramblings seldom needed any kind of links or documentation. That being the case I can report I’ve poked around in the wardrobes, steamer trunks and closets here back stage, and God help them they’ve given me access to all kinds of things.

While I was puttering around in the right hand column, I noticed ‘resources’ (“which”, says the narrator in my head “he’s seen and even used before but didn’t bother to make note of….”).

Bottom of that list….”White House”. Yep. The White House. I stopped trying to learn about QandO and clicked it. Attention span of a gnat I swear.

The White House.

I was greeted by the count-down clock for the destruction of the world, err, I mean the amount of time people have left to enroll in the mandatory health care system before the deadline is arbitrarily extend by the President on the afternoon of March 30th because not enough people will have enrolled. We may only need another 15% of the country to sign up anyway. What’s that you say?

Keep reading.

Slightly down the page there’s a tab – Engage and Connect – Opening the doors to the White House. Where it says “President Obama is committed to making this the most open and participatory administration in history.” That brought forth a friendly chuckle, and I had to know more. Ah, that zany transparency thing again, such kidders. Now I would learn how I could participate. Clicking on the link, I saw two more links under ‘participate’ – “We are a nation of immigrants” and “Speak out in support of Health Care Reform”. Apparently we are not asked to participate if we want to speak out against Health Care Reform, that isn’t particularly surprising, but I thought showhow it might be helpful to mention it here.

I clicked We are a nation of immigrants. They generously offered to let me give them my own immigrant story, which they can probably get from the NSA or FBI or my sister’s ancestry.com account, so I declined to give it to them again to avoid duplication. A link says the President is committed to common-sense reform that fixes our broken immigration system. Have you ever noticed it’s always going to be a common-sense reform? Phew, I thought he was for some crazy radical scheme like handing out citizenship to 11 million or so people who snuck into the country illegally!

1st point, Border Security – Beef up the borders. We now have more agents, specifically on the Canadian border. Probably to keep undocumented Canadian rodeo riders, country western singers and actors from sneaking in, though it doesn’t really say. I can’t tell how many agents…both numbers 3800 and 2200 are mentioned so maybe it’s 6000, agents now, but yeah! The site goes on to say we’ve doubled the number of agents nationwide since 2004, up to 21,000. By default, we may then assume we have more on the southern border too. No, we must assume because the numbers were a little vague. By ‘a little vague’, I mean nonexistent.

They didn’t say anything specifically about the increase of coverage on the southern border. Just that we had more boots on the ground. I presume we have people wearing the boots and didn’t just sort of scatter empty ones from Port Isabel to San Diego. Then again, it did say we’re using technologies to secure the land and maritime border. Maybe we have special sensors in empty boots that detect doctors, engineers and web programmers as they attempt to sneak in across our southern land border. They don’t mention if we have floating boot buoys at sea to keep zodiac boats full of undocumented physicists from sneaking in along the Gulf coast. Well, that was a good start anyway. I assume these are the professions of people who have already breached the border, because the Chamber of Commerce and the High Tech companies seem very keen to grant them all amnesty for their undocumented transgression, NOW.

– “It means cracking down more forcefully on businesses that knowingly hire undocumented workers…most businesses want to do the right thing… So we need to implement a national system that allows businesses to quickly and accurately verify someone’s employment status. And if they still knowingly hire undocumented workers, then we need to ramp up the penalties.”

President Barack Obama, January 29, 2013

Apparently we need a national system to check you out Ivan Ivanovitch, when you apply for a job, to make sure you’re here legally. It needs to be a national database. Fraud resistant tamper proof identification, which of course won’t be used for you to vote in elections, that would be wrong to disenfranchise you and only a racist would suggest such a thing. It will be required when you get a job at, 7-eleven, or McDonalds or Lockheed Martin or Booz Allen Hamilton. A nagging voice in my mind keeps mumbling about some national data collection thingy or other that was an overwhelming success in October of last year.

Anyway…

Penalties for hiring illegals will be significantly increased! Hurrah! Take that Koch brothers! Take that Mitt Romney! I don’t know that any of them hire illegals, unless Harry Reid says he heard someone say they did. All this made me wonder what weak worthless penalties we currently have in place for companies that hire illegal, I mean, undocumented, workers.

Well, that took the wind out of my sails. Well, that and seeing them being called illegal instead of undocumented even on the White House web site.

There were 4 items listed on how we’re going to fix immigration, and when I checked just one with sources other than the White House, it proved to be, uh, like saying I could keep my insurance plan if I liked it. 25% of the plan the White House is talking about is already crap and I haven’t even finished looking at half of it yet (which means 50% of the plan I do know about is crap).

So I stopped. That was sooooo disappointing.

There’s obviously a rogue intern at work here, or a low level functionary from Cincinnati. I considered sending a note to the President so he didn’t have to find out on the 6:00 PM news on Friday that someone in his administration wasn’t on the same page he was and was making him look silly on the White House web page. He’d be very angry, no one would be angrier.

Maybe I’d have better luck with “Speak out in support of Health Care reform”

I clicked the link. Ah there’s a nice picture of the President, sitting at a kitchen table…with a bunch of people who look like Tea Partiers…and a skin-head!!! Maybe it’s just the camera angle, maybe that guy has some hair on the back of his head, maybe it’s the edge of a NAZI tattoo! Lord! Nary a Secret Service agent in sight!

And the bold caption says “85% of Americans have already benefitted from the Affordable Care Act”. 85% of YOU, because so far as I know aside from an increased tax burden and higher premiums on a slightly less generous insurance plan, that number does NOT include me.

In 2005, the number of murders committed with a rifle was 445, while the number of murders committed with hammers and clubs was 605. In 2006, the number of murders committed with a rifle was 438, while the number of murders committed with hammers and clubs was 618.

And so the list goes, with the actual numbers changing somewhat from year to year, yet the fact that more people are killed with blunt objects each year remains constant.

For example, in 2011, there was 323 murders committed with a rifle but 496 murders committed with hammers and clubs.

Where is DiFi when you need her. License hardware stores. Register hammers. And get those nasty looking “assault hammers” off the market.

And by the way, there is no right to a hammer, is there? No Second Amendment for hammers or clubs. Where are the Democrats on this?

By the way, I assume you can do the math concerning the minute number of deaths in the US by rifle and figure out that for the most part it would be considered statistical noise if we were talking about anything else.

I see that your financial picture is looking rather dicey again. Sorry to hear that. Who could have guessed that high taxes, profligate spending and a general hostility to business would lead to such things? No worries, though. I’m sure political leaders will continue to work hard at righting the ship and get Maryland sailing along smoothly again (how is that plan to repeal the laws of economics coming anyway?).

On a related note, I understand that the Maryland legislature, in collaboration with Gov. O’Malley, has passed a new tax on all six-figure income earners in Maryland. Well, bully for you! That’ll teach those nasty capitalists to stop being so productive. And Gaia knows that they really need to pay their fair share (I mean, how is it that the top 20% of earners only pays about 68% of the income taxes? How’s that “fair”?). So, here’s hoping that works out for you (fingers crossed!).

Of course, I seem to recall that the last time you all did something like this (with that “Millionaires Tax” thingy), we here in Virginia experienced a bit of an influx of former Marylanders. Not too many that we couldn’t handle it, mind you, and probably fewer than some thought. But it does raise an issue, especially since the latest tax scheme stands to affect a much larger portion of Maryland’s population. While we’re always happy to welcome you all into the Commonwealth, we’d really appreciate it if you’d leave things here the way you found them.

You see, all too often when Virginia takes in refugees of high tax and high regulation states, they tend to bring a lot of those policies with them. They seem to really like our neighborhoods, schools and business environment, but for some reason they get all worked up about the fact that our government doesn’t spend as much money as they’re used to (in fact, we’ve actually had a budget surplus the past couple of years, and look to do so again this year!). They also tend to push for more state intrusion into our lives. Thing is, we really don’t like that. (In fact, it’s a fairly common complaint in the South.)

You see, before they came, we were doing just fine. Sure, some of us moved to places like New York and California so that we could enjoy that wonderful embrace of the Nanny State, but for the most part it’s been the other way around: people moving from high-tax/high-regulation states to places like Northern Virginia. We completely understand why you would want to leave a place whose policies increase your costs of living, impair your livelihoods, and generally intrude on your lives in unwanted ways. That’s why we try not to do that sort of thing here (albeit, with some annoying exceptions). Problem is, when you all move in, you start enacting all the same policies that made the place you left so bad. We’d all really appreciate it if you wouldn’t do that.

So, like I said, I really hope that whole tax-the-hell-outta-the-rich thing works for you. If it doesn’t, and your looking for change of scenery, you’ll always be welcomed with open arms on this side of the Potomac. Come on over, make yourselves comfortable and set a spell. Just don’t go touching anything.

We’ve talked before about how it seems that whatever the Obama campaign puts forward, oops, I mean “out there”, it seems to backfire on them in a way they don’t anticipate. As Dale Franks opines, the left takes their politics too seriously and so really don’t seem to understand that many times, when they start their hashtag slogans on Twitter or come up with campaign slogans that they’re teeing something up that the right will hit with glee and, for the most part, very snarky humor.

Well the new campaign slogan “Forward” is getting the treatment. ScottonCapeCod starts us with this one:

I like this one as well:

And a couple by Herder Breeder:

I especially like this one of circling the drain:

Get them out there. One effect weapon that can be wielded against the left is mockery. And after these last 3 plus years, they deserve every bit of it.

The millions of students who take the SAT or ACT each year will have to submit photos of themselves when they sign up for the college entrance exams, under a host of new security measures announced Tuesday in the aftermath of a major cheating scandal on Long Island.

The two companies that administer the tests, the College Board and ACT Inc., agreed to the precautions under public pressure brought to bear by Nassau County District Attorney Kathleen Rice, who is overseeing the investigation. The measures take effect in the fall.

"I believe these reforms, and many others which are happening behind the scenes, will prevent the kind of cheating that our investigation uncovered and give high schools and colleges the tools they need to identify those who try to cheat," Rice said.

Rice has charged 20 current or former students from a cluster of well-to-do, high-achieving suburbs on Long Island with participating in a scheme in which teenagers hired other people for as much as $3,500 each to take the exam for them. The five alleged ringers arrested in the case were accused of flashing phony IDs when they showed up for the tests. All 20 have pleaded not guilty.

Students have long had to produce ID to take the test (another example where ID is required), but the use of a picture is new. That is, students will now have to submit a head shot with their application for the tests. The picture will be printed on their ticket presented on the day of the test. Additionally the test results will be sent to their high school along with the picture of the student for a final check to ensure the student taking the test is the actual high school student.

All of this for what? To ensure the integrity of the testing system. Something, apparently, that is too much to ask when applied to the voting system.

And thus far, not a single cry about poor and minority students being disadvantaged. No one talking about anyone being “disenfranchised”. Go figure.

I happened to run across this page on Yahoo today, containing horoscopes for 2012. I thought they were a bit optimistic, though. Considering all the other analysis I’ve seen about what 2012 is expected to bring, I think we need more realistic horoscopes. I’m thinking something along the following lines:

Aries:

This is a good year to be true to your astrological sign and become a sheep herder. When it becomes difficult to buy food because of worldwide financial calamity, you’ll have sheep’s milk for cheese, and you can also shear the sheep to knit new clothing when your current clothes wear out. As a final measure, rack of lamb is delicious. Don’t forget to buy shears and knitting needles.

Taurus:

Of course, those under this sign tend to be bull-headed, and will probably be some of the last ones to admit that their savings and other investments have been wiped out. So harness that stubbornness, and doggedly insist that all your assets be converted to gold, and bury it in your back yard.

Gemini:

The sign of the twin is a good tip to stock up on duplicates of anything you really need for survival, since it might be hard to buy them after the meltdown hits. So buy another Glock, another shotgun, and another AR. Don’t forget extra ammo for all of them!

Cancer:

Your sign indicates that you should move somewhere that you will be able to catch shellfish for food. Watch for condo deals on the shoreline in New England and especially Alaska. You might want to consider taking a job on a crab boat to build up some expertise.

Leo:

Thank goodness you are endowed with bravery, since you’re going to need it this year. Use it to plan your defensive perimeter. Sight in likely entry points, and be ready to distribute the ammo you’ll need when the marauding invaders come for your food after they’ve finished looting the grocery stores.

Virgo:

Be true to your sign. This is not a good year to get pregnant and have small children to feed. If you do, you can forget about toys next Christmas; they’ll be lucky to get a full meal. Plus, the collapse of the school system means that if you do have children, you better stock up on home schooling supplies.

Libra:

Use this year to bring some balance to your life. Add martial arts to your shooting practice, for example. And you’ll balance better by losing some weight and getting in shape. That will make your home defense much easier during the food riots.

Scorpio:

Your natural tendency to be short tempered must be controlled this year especially. When a suspicious character comes to the door seeking food, don’t be too quick on the trigger. Instead, put out a sign explaining that you don’t have any food to give away, and pretend not to hear the door. Only shoot if they ignore those measures and try to break in.

Capricorn:

As with the advice for Aries, you should investigate keeping some goats. In addition to the advantages of sheep, goats also are cantankerous enough to assist in property defense. Their milk makes better cheese, but they’re not such good eating. So lay in some extra canned goods to go with your goat’s milk cheese. Watch out for Occupy Wall Street types, who will probably start rioting as soon as the grocery store runs out of goat’s milk cheese for their arugula and baby beet salad.

Aquarius:

This might be your year to express your affinity for water and buy a house boat. It would be a great haven to ride out the riots and other civil unrest, as long as you could find enough fuel to scamper off to a safe spot. Scout out some likely spots ahead of time to lay in some emergency freeze-dried food, and don’t forget your rain collector for potable water.

Pisces:

Your path to surviving 2012 will likely mean lots of fishing. Tune up your equipment, lay in some lures, and don’t forget spare knives for scaling and fileting your catch. A portable mercury tester wouldn’t be a bad idea either.